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DEFENCE OF THE NATIONAL DEMOCRACY AGAINST THE ATTACK OF JUDGE DOUGLAS- 
CONSTITUTIONAL EIGHTS OF THE STATES. 



SPEECH 



HON. J. P. BENJAMIN, OF LOUISB A A. 



DELIVERED IN THE UNITED STATES SENATE, MAY 22, I860. 



Mr. BENJAMIN. Mr. President, when we met here in December 
the public mind was deeply stirred. It was stirred by an occurrence 
which had taken place for the first time in our history — the invasion 
of one of the States of the Confederacy by a band of fanatics for the 
avowed purpose of interfering with its domestic institutions and setting 
its slaves at liberty. The whole country was deeply stirred, but espe- 
cially stirred was the South, and this universal excitement found im- 
mediate vent in Congress. Scarcely had we met, when numerous reso- 
lutions were placed upon our table by different Senators, which, on 
the 2d of February, were ordered, by a resolution of the Senate, to be 
printed together. The first was a resolution submitted by the honor- 
able Senator from Ohio, [Mr Pugh,] who, on the 15th of December, 
proposed that the Committee on Territories 

" Be instructed to inquire into the expediency of repealing so much of the acts approved 
September 9, 1850, for tbe organization of territorial governments, in New Mexico and 
Utah, as require that all the laws passed by the legislatures of those Territories shall be 
submitted to Congress for approval or rejection." 

That was offered on the 15th of December, before even the House 
of .Representatives had been organized. To that an amendment was 
offered by the Senator from Iowa, [Mr. Harlan,] which I shall not 
read. The next was a resolution submitted on the 16th of January 
by the Senator from Illinois, [Mr. Dou* las,] in relation to instructions 
to the Committee on the Judiciary to report a bill for the protection 
of the States and Territories of the Union against invasion. Next, 
on the 18th of January, were resolutions submitted by the Senator 
from Mississippi, [Mr. Brown.] Next, were amendments to those 
resolutions submitted by the Senator from Minnesota, [Mr. Wilkinson.] 
Next, were the resolutions submitted by the other Senator from Mis- 
sissippi, [Mr. Davis,] on the 2d of February ; and finally, to those 
resolutions amendments were offered by the Senator from Delaware. 
[Mr. Saulsbury.] 

Here, then, was a series of propositions before the Senate, seven in 
number, all directed to the question of slavery in the States and Ter- 
rifies, and all ordered by the Senate -" to be printed together for dis- 
cussion." Under these circumstances, it became obvious that, unless 
some concert of action was had by gentlemen who professed the same 



2 X5 

political principles in relation to this vital issue now before the coun- 
try, the discussion must be confused and pointless. If every member 
offered his own resolutions in his own language, and if there was no 
concert among those who entertained the same principles, the time of 
the Senate would be needlessly exhausted, and we should come to no 
practical result. Under these circumstances, a suggestion was made, 
from what quarter I know not, and certainly it is not of the slightest 
consequence, that the members of the Democratic party, who were 
supposed generally to entertain sentiments in accordance with each 
other, should meet and should agree upon the phraseology of the reso- 
lutions that they were disposed to support, and, after harmonizing 
upon that phraseology, should agree to stand by it, with a view to get 
a vote of the Senate upon distinct propositions, as the principles of 
the Democratic party, so far as that party was represented by the Sena- 
ators in Congress. 

Now, Mr. President, these resolutions being before us, the honor- 
able Senator from Illinois, [Mr. Douglas,] the other day — I am sorry 
that I do not see him in his seat ; I should have waited for him, if I 
had the slightest hope of seeing him in the Senate ; he was not here 
yesterday ; he is not here to-day ; and it is impossible for any one of 
us to say when he will be here again — the honorable Senator from 
Illinois, in one of the most extraordinary speeches ever delivered in a 
deliberative body, and which occupies over twenty consecutive columns 
of the Globe, and which was followed, a day or two after, in reply to 
the Senator from Mississippi, [Mr. Davis,] by several other columns, 
has undertaken what certainly is without precedent in the history of 
the country — has undertaken'to defend his individual claims to the 
Presidency of the United States; and, in so doing, has divided out his 
elaborately-prepared speech into different portions, some of which 
alone shall I attempt to answer ; and I attempt that answer because 
that Senator thought proper to arraign my State and to arraign me, 
with other Democratic States and other Democratic Senators, for daring 
to discuss the propositions and resolutions now before the Senate. 

More than half of that Senator's speech was devoted to the perfectly 
idle and unnecessary task of proving that those principles which he 
now asserts to be the true constitutional principles under which the 
Territories of the United States are governed, were advocated by him 
as such years and years ago ; and therefore he undertook to prove to 
the Senate and to the country — to which he appealed so often — that 
there has been no inconsistency in his course, and that if he and his 
brother Democratic Senators are at issue upon any point, it is we, and 
not he, who have proved inconsistent. I shall return to that, sir, in 
a moment. 

The next proposition of the honorable Senator from Illinois was, 
that he was the embodiment of the Democratic party, and that all. 
who dissented from this modest proposition were rebels. He next 
arraigned all his Democratic brethren in this Chamber for daring to 
offer resolutions to the Senate declaratory of constitutional principles : 
and he called the resolutions now before us a caucus platform, whi^J 
he said the Charleston convention, which represents him, treated tfith 
the scorn and contempt that they merrited. 



Next he said that seventeen Democratic States of this Union, and 
all his brother Democratic Senators who did not agree with him, 
were disunionists, and he arraigned them as such. He said that they 
were travelling on the high road to the disunion of these States. 
Then, in the plenitude of his indulgence, he told us that we were 
sinning through ignorance and did not know what road we were 
travelling, and, with princely magnanimity, tendered his clemency 
and his pardon to those who, after being enlightened by his counsel, 
should tender repentance. And after having done all that — having 
attacked every Democratic State in the Union, and almost every 
Democratic Senator in this body, he closed with a statement that 
all that he had said was in self-defence ; that he attacked nobody, 
and that the world should know, if he ever spoke again, it would 
be, as he had just then spoken, to defend himself from attack. 

Now, Mr. President, lest I should be supposed to have at all ex- 
aggerated, in this statement, what the honorable Senator from 
Illinois thought proper to say in relation to resolutions involving 
purely constitutional and political principles, I will read here and 
there passages from his speech, in support of the assertion that I 
made. In relation to the action of his brother Senators, he savs 
this: 

" Sir, let the Democratic Senators attend to their official duties, and leave the national con- 
ventions to make their platforms, and the party will be united. Where does this trouble 
come from ? From our own caucus chambers— a caucus of Senators dictating to the people 
what sort of platform they shall have. You have been told that no less than twelve southern 
Senators warned you in the caucus against the consequences of trying to force senatorial 
caucus platforms on the party. Sir, I do not know when the people ever put it in a Cenator's 
commission that he is to get up platforms for the national conventions, on the supposition 
that the delegates who go there have not sense enough to do it themselves. 

"Although the action of the caucus was heralded to the world to be, as was genorally 
understood, for the purpose of operating on the Charleston convention, it did not have its 
effect. The resolutions lay still. When it was proposed to postpone them here in the Sen- 
ate, before the Charleston convention, I voted against the postponement. 1 wanted to give 
a chance for a vote on them before the party acted. I did not believe the party then would 
agree to the dictation. I do not think they would obey the order. Sir, the Charleston con- 
vention scorned it, and ratified th?- old platform." 

I appeal to the Senate whether or not this is self-defence. I appeal 
to the Senate whether or not this be, as I have stated it to be, an ar- 
raignment by the honorable Senator from Illinois against the action 
of almost the entire body of his brother Democrats — a perversion of 
the truth and the facts, a misrepresentation of what occurred ; for 
this, namely, that the meeting of the Senators who adopted a series of 
resolutions, which they believed to be sound constitutional doctrine, 
was based upon the fact that a large series of independent resolutions 
had been put before the Senate, and that some concerted action of the 
party in relation to those resolutions was just as necessary as the con- 
certed action of the parties who supported the Kansas-Nebraska bill 
in 1854, when the honorable Senator from Illinois called them int<> 
council every morning almost of his life during that controversy. 
When that bill was pending ; when amendments were offered around 
the. Chamber, for the purpose of concentrating action and preventing 
that division of the party which might be taken advantage of by the 
opponents upon the floor of the Senate, the honorable Senator from 
Illinois called together those who supported the bill every morning, 



and- asked their opinions, and changed and modified the phraseology 
to suit all and to obtain the assent of all. That was the purpose of 
the Democratic Senators who met to consider resolutions that Senators 
all around the Chamber had offered. That they did ; and that is what 
has been perverted into an attempt to dictate a party platform to a 
convention. 

Nay, more, sir, in order that there might be no possibility of mis- 
representing those resolutions as being the dictation of a party plat- 
form, the Senate postponed the consideration of the resolutions until 
after the party had met and made what the Senator from Illinois says 
is its platform ; and that very postponement is brought up here as an 
arraignment of the intentions of the Senators, who are now speaking 
on these resolutions after the platform has been made, as he says. It 
was with the view, as he now says, to affect his presidential chances. 
I leave that accusation for what it is worth. I have stated the accu- 
sation, and stated the defence. 

Next, sir, I say that the honorable Senator from Illinois, not satis- 
fied with discussing the constitutional questions now before the Senate 
upon their merits, has thought proper to arraign seventeen Democratic 
States of this Union as disunionists. He accompanies it with the sug- 
gestion that he forgives us, because we know not what we do. • I say, 
sir, the fact that the Senator from Illinois arraigns seventeen Demo- 
cratic States, and nearly all his Democratic brethren here, as disunion- 
ists, I will also show, by an extract from his speech the other day, of 
a few lines. He tells us that these resolutions are a Yancey platform ; 
and that the resolutions reported to the Charleston convention by a 
majority of the States of this Union, by the almost unanimous assent 
of the Democratic States of the Union, was a Yancey platform also ; 
and that Yancey made the platform for the party, made the caucus 
platform, and made the platform for the majority of the Democratic 
States of the Union ; and that all, together with Yancey, we are dis- 
unionists. Here is his language, sir : 

" The Yancey platform at Charleston, known as the majority report from the committee 
on resolutions, in substance and spirit and legal effect, was the same as the Senate caucus 
resolutions ; the same as the resolutions now under discussion, and upon which the Senate is 
called upon to vote. 

" I do not suppose that any gentleman advocating this platform in the Senate means or 
desires disunion. I acquit each and every man of such a purpose ; but I believe, in my con- 
science, that such a platform of principles, insisted upon, will lead directly and inevitably to 
a dissolution of the Union. This platform demands congressional intervention for slavery in 
the Territories in certain events. What are these events? In the event that the people of a. 
Territory do not want slavery, and will not provide by law for its introduction and protec- 
tion, and that fact shall be ascertained judicially, then Congress is to pledge itself to pass 
laws to force the Territories to have it." 

So, sir, these resolutions are a "Yancey platform," a caucus plat- 
form, a disunion platform ; and the purpose is, of all who support 
them and vote for them, after the people of a Territory shall have 
decided that " they do not want slavery, and that fact has been ascer- 
tained judicially, to get Congress to force slavery on them." That 
is the deliberate statement, prepared and put forth to the wor^-i, 
revised and corrected by the honorable Senator from Illinois. Mr. 
President, my State voted for that platform. I shall vote 5 )r . tn ^ s 
caucus- Yancey platform, if that helps the Senator from Illinois. — 



If it helps liim to give nicknames, and he thinks that an appeal 
to the people of the country will be helped by accusing Democratic 
States and Democratic Senators of being led by a gentleman whom 
he supposes to be unpopular, and calls them supporters of a Yan- 
cey platform and of a disunion platform, let him have the benefit 
of such appeal. I, for my part, accept the responsibility, and stand 
by the resolutions and the platform. But, sir, at the same time I 
deny that there is the slightest approach to truth or correctness in the 
lineaments ascribed by tke honorable Senator from Illinois to the 
platform adopted by the majority of the Democratic States at Charles- 
ton, or to the principles which are here advocated by the almost 
unanimous vote of the Democratic Senators. I deny that there is the 
least approach to truth in his picture. No man here has called upon 
Congress to force slavery upon an unwilling people. No man here 
has called upon Congress to intervene and force slavery into the Ter- 
ritories. No man has asked Congress to do what the gentleman 
speaks of in another part of his spaech as making a slave code for the 
Territories — that being another of the slang phrases which the hon- 
orable Senator from Illinois adopts from Republican gentlemen at the 
North, and parades to the American people as proof that he is sound 
on this subject of the Democracy, and that we are unsound. No man 
has asked for such a thing, or anything approaching to such a thing, 
as I shall proceed hereafter to show. 

Now, Mr. President, having shown to you the charges made by the 
honorable Senator from Illinois against the Democratic States of this 
Confederacy, and the Democratic Senators in this Hall — which charges 
I repel and mean to disprove to-day — I desire to read a few words 
which I find at the close of his speech, for the purpose of showing how 
nearly and how closely his conclusions and his speech accord with 
what I have just stated : 

" I am sorry to have been forced to occupy so much of the time of the Senate ; but the 
Senate will bear me witness that I have not spoken, in the last two years, on any one of 
these topics, except when assailed, and then in self-defence. You will never find the discus- 
sion renewed here again by me, except in self-defence. I have studiously avoided attacking 
any man, because I did not mean to give a pretext for renewing the assault on me ; and the 
world shall understand that if my name is brought into this delate again, it will be done 
aggressively, as an assault on me ; and if I occupy any more time, it will be onlv in self- 
defense." 

Mt. President, this mode of discussing public subjects is a very con- 
venient one — arraigning every gentleman sitting here on this side of 
the Chamber, attacking them in the most offensive of all manners ; 
spreading that attack, revised and corrected, in the official columns of 
the Globe, issuing it out to the world ; and then saying that if any 
man should raise his voice here to repel it, it will be an assault on him, 
and the world shall know that he does not speak except in self-defence. 
He makes it impossible to answer his charges without attacking his 
course, and then says he is driven by self-defence to fresh assaults ! I 
am afraid, Mr. President, that I shall be obnoxious to the charge of 
^sailing the honorable Senator from Illinois,, if it be indeed an assault 
fo-^epel a most wanton and unprovoked attack. 

fkra than one-half the speech of the honorable Senator from Illi- 
nois Wx S devoted, as-I said before, to the purpose of proving his own 



consistency, from some period which I do not care to go back to, down 
to 1854 and 1856, and the present time. He says he is now consistent 
with the principles that he then professed. I do not deny it. I do 
not know that anybody denies it. On the contrary, that is the pre- 
cise charge brought against him, as I shall proceed to show. The pre- 
cise charge is that, having agreed with us that he would abandon 
those principles, if they were proved to be false, he now flies from his 
bargain ; he now denies what he agreed to ; he now refuses to be 
bound by that to which he had previously given his consent ; and de- 
fends himself, because, as he says, he is now in accordance with what 
he was then. I do not propose to go back beyond the year 1857 ; be- 
cause every one here knows that, up to the year 1857, the honorable 
Senator from Illinois had the cordial friendship and support of all the 
members of the Democratic party. Every one on this floor knows that, 
up to the year 1857, the honorable Senator irom Illinois was looked 
upon with pride and confidence as one of the acknowledged leaders of 
the Democratic party. 

Now, Mr. President, is it not a subject deserving of some inquiry ; 
will it not naturally suggest itself to the American people to inquire 
how happens it that a gentleman, who for a long series of years pos- 
sessed the confidence and admiration of his party, upon whom they 
looked with pride, whom they acknowledged as a leader, and for whom 
they reserved their choicest honors, should suddenly find himself sepa- 
rated from every Democratic State in the Union, and from the whole 
body of his Democratic associates here and in the other House. What 
magic has effected this change in the universal sentiment towards 
him ? What occult power has been brought to bear upon the Senator 
from Illinois, that to-day he complains and whines that he is the sub- 
ject of a common assault by gentlemen who were formerly with him, 
and who, he says, are pursuing him with ruthless malignity? How 
happens it that the Senator from Illinois forgot to touch that part of 
the recent history of the country in his speech ? I propose to com- 
mend myself to the consideration of that part of the history. 

When, in 1854, the Kansas-Nebraska bill was before us— I must be 
guilty of some repetition ; it is impossible to avoid it when a question 
has been worn so threadbare — there were three distinct sentiments 
professed upon this floor in relation to the government of the Terri- 
tories of the United States. The gentlemen on the other side of the 
Chamber professed the principle that the Congress of the United States 
had the power to govern the Territories, and that there was to be found 
in the Constitution of the United States no prohibition against exer- 
cising that power so as to exclude slavery ; and they therefore went 
for excluding slavery from the Territories by the power of Congress, 
which had an admitted power to govern them. The southern mem- 
bers of the Democratic party, -with some of the members from the 
North, agreed with the Republican party that the Congress of the 
United States had the undoubted power to govern the Territories ; but 
they held that there was a limitation to that power to be found in t*e 
Constitution of the United States, which limitation prevented *fce 
Congress of the United States from exercising the power to exclude 
slavery ; but, on the contrary, imposed it as a duty upon Co*g ress t0 



protect property in slaves, just as all other property. The third school 
had at its head, at that time, the venerable Senator from Michigan, 
now in the Department of State. With him were joined the honorable 
Senator from Illinois, and the honorable Senator from Michigan then, 
Mr. Stuart, I think. They held that the sole power of Congress was 
to institute an organic act, as they termed it ; that the sole power was 
to give, as it were, a constitution to the Territories by which the people 
might be brought together in organized form, and that when the people 
were thus brought together in an organized form, in a legislative 
capacity, they possessed inherent sovereignty, just as a State, and had 
a right to do in relation to slavery just as they pleased. 

Those were the three principles advocated upon this floor. I think 
I state them correctly. I try to do so, at all events. When we were 
discussing the principle to be introduced into the Kansas-Nebraska 
bill, we all agreed that we were opposed to the principles advocated 
hy the Republican party. We all agreed that whether Congress had 
the power or not to exclude slavery from the Territories, it was inju- 
rious to exercise that power ; that Congress ought not to intervene. 
That is what we said, and all the Senators from the South concurred 
with that. When we came further to determine what was to be done, 
after having decided that Congress should not intervene, we split. 
The Democrats of the South, and some of the Democrats of the North 
agreeing with them, in our caucus meetings, in discussing the princi- 
ples of the bill, in framing its provisions, in preparing it for for dis- 
cussion in the Senate, said: "The Territorial Legislature has no 
power to exclude the people of the South, or their property, from the 
Territories, because the Territories are governed by Congress as a 
trustee for all the States ; the Territorial Legislature can get no 
power but the power that Congress gives it, aud Congress itself has no 
power to exclude our property from the Territories, which belong to us 
as well as to the free States." The Senator from Illinois said differ- 
ently. The Senator from Illinois said that he believed the Territorial 
Legislature had the right, whilst the people of the Territory were in 
a territorial organization, to exclude slavery if they pleased. We 
split on that ; we could not agree. I admit all that the Senator said 
here the other day as to it. He said so then ; he says now. I com- 
plain exactly of that consistency ; because when we could not agree, 
he said that he would agree with us to submit it to the courts, and if 
the courts decided in our favor, he would give up aud join us ; aud 
we agreed if the courts decided against us, that we would give up and 
join him. It is that very consistency that is complained of; and I 
shall proceed to prove it. 

It is bad faith when the honorable Senator no longer worships at 
the shrine of constitutional principle. Professing to agree to leave 
the matter to the decision of the courts, professing to respect the courts 
in their decisions, he has gone astray after false gods, and is now 
worshiping the idols of evasion and circumvention. Sir, I do not 
state of my own authority the position of the honorable Senator from 
Illinois, I read again from his speech the other day. He is speaking 
<J the power of a Territorial Legislature to exclude slavery. The Sen- 
ato-i from Illinois is right in saying that his opinion was clearly 



8 

explained at the time. He asserted the power in the Territorial 
Legislature : 

" I believed the power existed : others believed otherwise ; we agreed to differ ; we agreed 
to refer it to the judiciary ; we agreed to abide by their decision: and I, true to my agree- 
ment, referred my colleague to the courts to find out whether the power existed or not. The 
fact that I referred him to the courts has been cited as evidence that I did not think individ- 
ually that the power existed in a Territorial Legislature. After the evidences that I produced 
yesterday, and the debate just read upon the Trumbull amendment, no man who was au actor 
in those scenes has an excuse to be at a loss as to what my opinion was." 

The Senator from Illinois is right ; his opinion was clearly expressed 
at the time. He asserted the power in the Territorial Legislature : 

"But it was not my opinion that was to govern; it was the opinion of the court on the 
question arising under a territorial law after the Territory should have passed a law upon the 
subject. Bear in mind that the report introducing the bill was that these questions touching 
the right of property in slaves were referred to the local courts, to the territorial courts with 
a right of appeal to the Supreme Court of the United States. When that case shall arise, 
and the court shall pronounce its judgment, it will be binding on me, on you, sir, and on every 
good citizen. It must be carried out in good faith; and all the power of this government — 
the Army, the Navy, and the militia — all that we have — must be exerted to carry the decision 
into effect in good faith, if there be resistence. Do not bring the question back here for 
Congress to review the decision of the court, nor for Congress to explain the decision of the 
court. The court is competent to construe its own decisions, and issue its own decrees to 
carry its decisions into effect. 

" We are told that the court has already decided the question. If so, there is an end of the 
controversy. You agreed to abide by it; I did. If it has decided it, let the decision go into 
effect ; there is an end of it ; what are we quarrelling about ? Will resolutions of the Senate 
give any additional authority to the decision of the Supreme Court of the United States ? Does 
it need an endorsement by the Charleston convention to give it validity ? If the decision is 
made, it is the law of the land, and we are all bound by it. If the decision is not made, then 
what right have you to pass resolutions here, prejudging the question, with a view to influen- 
eing the views of the court ? If there is a dispute as to the true interpretation and meaning 
of the decision of the court, who can settle the true construction except the court itself, when 
it arises in another case? Can you determine by resolutions here what the decision of the 
court is, or what it ought to be, or what it will be ? It belongs to that tribunal. The Consti- 
tution has wisely separated the political from the judicial department of the Government. 
The Constitution has wisely made the courts a co-ordinate branch of the Government; as inde- 
pendent of us as we are of them. Sir, jou have no right to instruct that court how they shall 
decide this question in dispute. You have no right to define their decision for them. When 
that decision is made, they will issue the proper process for carrying it into effect ; and the 
Executive is clothed with the Army, the Navy, and the militia, the wnole power of the Gov- 
ernment, to execute that decree. All I ask, therefore, of you, is non-intervention ; hands off. 
In the language of the Georgia resolutions, let the subject be banished forever from the Halls 
of Congress or the political arena, and referred to the Territories, with a right of appeal to 
the courts; and there is an end to the controversy." 

Mr. President, I have read that extract at length, that all may see 
the precise point at which the honorable Senator from Illinois has 
separated himself from his Democratic brethren and the Democratic 
party. I have him here now, in his speech before the Senate the 
other day, declaring that that was the bargain ; that whenever the 
court made the decision he would stand by it ; that he had always 
intended to stand by it ; that it was binding on him in good faith ; 
and that the whole power of the government should, with his consent, 
be called into operation for the purpose of carrying out the decision. 
I shall proceed presently to show that the Senator from Illinois, not 
once, but again and again, since 1857, has been engaged, in conjunc- 
tion with gentlemen of the Black Republican party, first in endeavor- 
ing to explain away the decision that has been made, and next tb-'*t 
he has made the broad and open avowal in the face of the country 



that, ii the decision is made, it shall not go into effect. That is the 
arraignment of the honorable senator from Illinois. Let him not go 
back to 1840 ? or 1844, or 1848, or 1852, or 1854, when he had the 
party with him, nor even to 1856 ; but let him come clown to the 
decision of the Supreme Court of the United States, in -the spring of 
1857, and let him follow me while I pursue his devious track since 
that day. 

Early in the year 1857 the Dred Scott decision was pronounced by 
the Supreme Court of the United States. If my recollection serves 
me, the decision had not been printed when we adjourned. A number 
of us, I think, subscribed together to obtain a number of copies from 
the public printer, agreeing that he should print such a number as we 
believed the Senate would be willing to have printed when it reassem- 
bled ; and if the Senate declined to print it, when it assembled, we made 
ourselves responsible to him for the price. It was desired that the deci- 
sion of the Supreme Court should go to the country. The dissenting 
opinions of the two judges, who were in the minority, had been printed. 
The opinion of the court was still unknown. The result of its opinion 
was pretty well ascertained ; but in a matter of that magnitude it 
was deemed of the last importance to have the very language of the 
court, and to have it spread broadcast through the land. Now, Mr. 
President, we are told that this decision decides nothing of what was 
at issue at the time ; nothing of that issue which the honorable Sena- 
tor from Illinois agreed to leave to the courts. I do not know any 
better way of ascertaining what a court decided than to do as the hon- 
orable Senator from Illinois has advised us to do — take the court's own 
statement of what it decided. In reference to this Dred Scott decision, 
it will be observed by any gentleman who chooses to refer to the nine- 
teenth volume of Howard's Reports, that every judge gave his opinion 
seriatim ; because there were numerous questions on which all did not 
choose to be bound without giving a statement of their particular 
views ; but Mr. Chief Justice Taney delivered the opinion of the court. 
The rest were mere statements of particular views. " Mr. Chief Just- 
ice Taney," is the expression, " delivered the opinion of the court;" 
and Mr. Chief Justice Taney is said to have made a syllabus of the 
points which he, the organ of the court, considered to have been de- 
cided by the court. 

Now, in regard to the attempt to get rid of the authority of this de- 
cision on the ground that the questions were not before the court, and 
that tfiey were obiter dicta, allow me to say this : it is true that when a 
precise point is before a court, the judgment of the court upon that 
point is alone that which binds the parties ; but no lawyer will con- 
tradict the assertion, that those principles which the court itself lays 
down as being the basis upon which it arrives at its conclusion, are 
decisions by the court ; they are not obiter dicta. Obiter dicta, merely 
passing sayings, are such views thrown out by a judge in the course 
of his reasoning as have no reference to the points upon which he is 
deciding the case ; but whenever, in order to reach a result, the court 
proceeds to give those reasons for that result, and in giving those 
reasons for arriving at the result, it lays down the principle's upon 
which the result is reached, I say those principles are considered as 



10 

decided by the court. If unnecessary to its decision, they have less 
weight ; but if the court itself declares the principles that it lays down 
to be necessary to its decision, and declares that it does decide them, 
then I say no lawyer can fail, when that case is brought up before the 
court, to say the court has so decided. 

I do not chose to go into that at any length, nor even to read the 
syllabus of the decision of the Supreme Court. But what were we di- 
vided about in the year 1854, and what was it that the honorable Sen- 
ator from Illinois agreed to leave to the decision of the Supreme Court 
of the United States, upon a case to be brought up from the local Leg- 
islature of Kansas ? It was this : has Congress the power to govern 
the Territories of the United States, or is that power in the Territorial 
Legislature ? Has Congress the right to exclude slavery from the 
Territories, or can it delegate that right to a Territorial Legislature ; 
or has a Territorial Legislature, in the absence of any delegation of this 
power by Congress, an inherent right to exclude slavery ? These are 
the points. 

When this case was brought before the Supreme Court of the United 
States, the question of the power of Congress arose directly — no man 
has ever denied that — the power of Congress to declare that a slave 
should be free by being carried into the Territories of the United States 
north of the Missouri compromise line. That, then, brought directly 
in question the power of Congress to exclude slavery from the Terri- 
tories ; its power to govern them, and the limit upon that power. 
What did the court say ? In referring to a former decision, it says : 

" Perhaps the power of governing a Territory belonging to the United States" — 

Observe this language — 

"which has not, BY BECOMING A STATE, acquired the means of self-government"— 

Taking it for granted that every man must at once admit that it is 
only when it becomes a State that it has acquired the power of self- 
government : 

" Perhaps the power of governing a Territory belonging to the United States, which has 
not, 61/ becoming a State, acquired the means of self-government, may result, necessarily, 
from the facts that it is not within the jurisdiction of any particular State, and is within the 
power and jurisdiction of the United States. The right to govern may be the inevitable con- 
sequence ot the right to acquire territory. "Whichever may be the source from which the 
power is derived, the possession of it is unquestionable." 

Mr, PUGH. What is that ? 

Mr. BENJAMIN. I am reading the citation from Canter's case, 
found in the Dred Scott decision. What did the court, in comment- 
ing on that 

Mr. PUGH. I only want to ask the Senator whether, in the Dred 
Scott decision, it is not quoted for the purpose of being commented 

upon? 

Mr. BENJAMIN. I am going on to show, if the Senator will per- 
mit me, that the court adopted that in the Dred Scott case. I do not 
think I leave quite such an open joint as that in my argument. The 
court, in the Dred Scott case, go on : 



11 

" It is thus clear, from the whole opinion on this point, that the court did not mean to de- 
cide whether the power was derived from the clause in the Constitution, or was the necessary 
consequence of the right to acquire. They do decide that the power in Congress is unques- 
tionable, and in this we entirely concur, and nothing will be found in this opinion to the coutrary. 
The power stands firmly on the latter alternative put by the court — that is, as ' the inevitable 
consequence oftfie right to acquire territory.' " 

They entirely concurred. Is that decided in the Dred Scott case? 

Mr. PUGH. If the Senator asks rae, I think the sentence he em- 
phasized is expressly excluded by the language of Judge Taney. He 
emphasized the first paragraph ; and then Judge Taney says the 
power stands on the last paragraph. 

Mr. BENJAMIN. Well, I will give you another chance. Let us 
take 19 Howard, page 445, referring to that same decision in Canter's 
case '. 

"Thus it will be seen by these quotations from the opinion, that the court, after Btating the 
question it was about to decide in a manner too plain to be misunderstood, proceeded to 
decide it, and announced, as the opinion of the tribunal, that in organizing the judicial depart- 
ment of the government in a Territory of the United States, Congress does not act under, 
and is not restricted by, the third article in the Constitution, and is not bound, in a Territory, to 
ordain and establish courts in which the judges hold their offices during good behavior, but may 
exercise the discretionary power which a State exercises in establishing its judicial depart- 
ment, aud regulating the jurisdiction of its courts, and may authorize the territorial govern- 
ment to establish, or may itself establish, courts in which the judges hold their offices for a 
term of years only; and may vest in them judicial power upon subjects confided to the judi- 
ciary of the United States. And in doing this, Congress undoubtedly exercises the combined power of 
the General and a State government. It exercises the discretionary power of a State government 
in authorizing the establishment of a court in which the judges hold their appointments for 
a term of years only, and not during good behavior; and it exercises the power of the Gen- 
eral Government in investing that court with admiralty jurisdiction, over which the Genera! 
Government had exclusive jurisdiction in the Territory. 

" No one, we presume, will question the correctness of that opinion ; nor is there anything 
in conflict with it in the opinion now given." 

How now? 

Mr. PUGH. I do not think that helps you any. 

Mr. BENJAMIN. The Congress of the United States has the dis- 
cretionary power of a State in the Territories. The Congress of the 
United States has the undoubted power to govern the Territories, as 
they are called. 

Mr. PUGH. The Senator surely knows that the decision does not 
say that. It says Congress has that power in the establishment of 
courts and conferring admiralty jurisdiction. That very paragraph 
in Canter's case was debated in the Senate four years ago between the 
Senator from Illinois [Mr. Trumbull] and the Senator from Michigan, 
General Cass. The court's attention was drawn to it. 

Mr. BENJAMIN. The court's attention was evidently drawn to 
it, as the Senator says ; but will the Senator tell me that the Congress 
of the United States has the power to exercise the discretionary power 
of a State in a Territory, in organizing its judiciary, without having 
any power to govern the Territory ? 

Mr. PUGH. So far as the courts of the United States are concerned, 
it exercises the same power within the States ; for it provides for set- 
tling a controversy between two individuals by the action of the Federal 
Government. 

Mr. BENJAMIN. Doe3 the Senator say that the Congress of the 



12 

United States has power to provide for establishing judges in the States 
for a term of years ? 

Mr. PUG-H. No, sir; because the Constitution forbids that; but I 
say, and that is what the court means, that in clothing the territorial 
courts with admiralty jurisdiction, first in the establishment of the 
courts, and next in defining their jurisdiction, they exercise powers 
appertaining both to the Federal and State Governments ; but as to 
asserting that Congress had all the powers of a State Government in 
a Territory, it is neither in Canter's case nor in the Dred Scott case, 
nor any other. 

Mr. BENJAMIN. Assuredly, the Supreme Court of the United 
States tells us exactly where they stop. They say Congress has all the 
powers of a State in a Territory, except where the Constitution of the 
United States interferes. That, perhaps, is also disputed. 

Mr. PUGH. Yes. 

Mr. BENJAMIN. Very well; let me read the decision : 

" As we have before said " — 
speaking of this territory belonging to the United States — 

" It was acquired by the General Government, as the representative and trustee of the 
people of the United States, and it must, therefore, be held in that character for their com- 
mon and equal benefit; for it was the people of the several States, acting through their agent 
and representative, the Federal Government, who in fact acquired the Territory in question, 
and the Government holds it for their common use until it shall be associated with the other 
States as a member of the Union. 

" But until that time arrives, it is undoubtedly necessary that some government should be 
established, in order to organize society, and protect the inhabitants in their persons and prop- 
erty ; and as the people of the United States could act in thi3 matter only through the Gov- 
ernment which represented them, and through which they spoke and acted when the Territory 
was obtained, it was not ouly within the scope of its powers, but it was its duty, to pass such 
laws and establish such a government as would enable those by whose authority they acted Co 
reap the advantages anticipated from its acquisition, and to gather there a population which 
would enable it to assume the position to which it was destined among the States of the Union. 
The power to acquire necessarily carries with it the power to preserve and apply to the pur- 
poses for which it was acquired. The form of government to be established necessarily rested 
in the discretion of Congress. It was their duty to establish the one that would be best suited 
for the protection and security of the citizens of the United States, and other inhabitants who 
might be authorized to take up their abode there, and that must always depend upon the ex- 
isting condition of the Territory, as to the number and character ot its inhabitants, and their 
situation in the Territory. In some cases a government, consisting of persons appointed by 
the Federal Government, would best subserve the interests of the Territory when the inhabi- 
tants were few and scattered and new to one another. In other instances, it would be more 
advisable to commit the powers oj self-government to the people who had settled in the Terri- 
tory, as being the most competent to determine what was best for their own interests. But 
some form of civil authority would be absolutely necessary to organize and preserve civilized 
society, and prepare it to become a State; and what is the best form must always depend on 
the condition of the Territory at the time, and the choice of the mode must depend upon the 
exercise of a discretionary power by Congress, acting within the scope of its constitutional 
authority, and not infringing vpon the rights of person or the rights of properly cf the citizen 
who might go there to reside, or for any other lawful purpose. It was acquired by the exercise of 
this discretion, and it must be held and governed <n like manner, until it is fitted to be a Stite." 

The Congress has not only the right to govern it, but_ the right 
either to govern it by delegating persons to hold authority, or by 
exercising its discretion and committing to the people the right of 
self-government — giving to the people the right of self-government ; 
by the action of Congress, not by inherent sovereignty — a grant to 
be made by Congress to the people of a Territory, of self-govern- 
ment through their Legislature ; and yet the honorable Senator 



13 

from Illinois [Mr. Douglas] tells us that, although the Supreme 
Court of the United States decided in that case (a decision by 
which he agreed to abide) that the Congress of the United States have 
the unquestioned power to govern the Territories ; and although 
the court decided that Congress could govern them in any way it 
pleased in its discretion ; and although the court decided that one 
mode of governing them was for Congress to commit to the in- 
habitants there a power of self-government ; when Congress has 
committed that power, he says that the people who got it from 
Congress have more right than Congress itself; and that the Terri- 
torial Legislature, which draws its legislative power from a grant 
by Congress, can rise higher than the powers possessed by the 
grantor ; or, in other words, that the stream can rise above its 
source. 

Mr. PUGH. Does the Senator say that the court meant that Con- 
gress makes a grant of the power of self-government to the people of 
a Territory ? 

Mr. BENJAMIN. Clearly. 

Mr. PUGH. Where does Congress get the power of self-govern- 
ment? The phrase is that Congress has power of self-government 
over a Territory. It is a contradiction in terms. 

Mr. BENJAMIN. Who says that ? Here is the same idol — eva- 
sion. 

Mr. PUGH. If I should respond to the Senator in equal temper, I 
should call liis an evasion. I desire to know where he finds, in the 
Dred Scott case, the proposition. 

Mr. BENJAMIN. The court says that Congress may, without 
reference to the action of the people of a Territory, govern it as_ it 
pleases in its discretion. Then the court says that Congress may, in- 
stead of that, give to the people the power of self-government. 

Mr. PUGH. "Commit." 

Mr. BENJAMIN. Commit to the people the power of self-govern- 
ment. What is there absurd in that ? 

Mr. PUGH. There is nothing absurd in that ; but I was about to 
say to the Senator, if that phrase fits him,- 1 hope he will give the ex- 
planation 

Mr. BENJAMIN. The absurdity, if any, is that of the court, not 
mine. 

Mr. PUGH. Undoubtedly in the case of Louisiana, which the Sen- 
ator from Georgia cited yesterday, that act was simply preliminary, 
to get possession of the country, and until you have a sufficient com- 
munity it is all idle to talk about self-government ; but I understand 
that paragraph to be that, whenever the period arrives that a commu- 
nity is there and Congress recognizes the community, Congress has no 
power of self-government to grant ; it has no such power. If there is 
any such power it comes from some other place, and I say it does 
not come trom Congress. Congress did not have it. 

Mr. BENJAMIN. What is meant by Congress committing the 
power of self-government to the people ? 

Mr. PUGH. Acknowledging it. 

Mr. BENJAMIN. Commit means to acknovAedge? Very well. 



14 

Mr. PUGrH. In that sense. I ask the Senator how Congress can 
commit a power which Congress could not by any possibility have ; 
for it is an absurdity in terms to say that Congress has the power of 
self-government in the Territories ? 

Mr. BENJAMIN. Congress has the power of government. 

Mr. PUGH. Then leave the word " self" out. 

Mr. BENJAMIN. Exactly, when applied to Congress. Congress 
has the power of government over the Territories ; but when Congress 
commits the power to the people to govern themselves that is a power 
of self-government in them. It seems to me so plain that language 
cannot make it plainer. I cannot pursue the discussion on that point 
with the Senator from Ohio. 

But, sir, the Supreme Court of the United States, in relation to this 
power of Congress and of the Territorial Legislatures, has not stopped 
where I have just read. It has gone further, and said : 

" The powers over person and property of which we speak " — 

that is, the power of confiscating the slaves of the citizens of the slave- 
holding States, if they go into the Territories — 

"are not only not granted to Congress, but are in express terms denied, and they are forbidden 
to exercise them. And this prohibition is not confined to the States, but the words are gen- 
eral, and extend to the whole territory over which the Constitution gives it power to legislate, 
including those portions of it remaining under territorial government, as well as that covered 
by States. It is a total absence of power everywhere within the dominion of the United States, 
and places the citizens of a Territory, so far as these rights are concerned, on the same foot- 
ing with the citizens of the States, and guards them as firmly and plainly against any inroads 
which the General Government might attempt under the plea of implied or incidental powers, 
and if Congress itself cannot do this ; if it is beyond the powers conferred on the Federal Gov- 
ernment it will be admitted, we presume, that it could not authorize a territorial government 
to exerciset hem. It could confer no power on any local government established by its au- 
thority to violate the provisions of the Constitution." 

Congress cannot destroy the property of a citizen in his slave in a 
Territory. Congress can commit to the people of a Territory the 
power of government — the Senator says "self-government" is ab- 
surd — then, let us say the power of government ; but in so committing 
it, the court say they presume it will be admitted that Congress can- 
not authorize a territorial government to exercise the powers which 
Congress itself is prohibited from exercising. Again : 

" And if the Constitution recognizes the right of property of the master in a slave, and 
makes no distinction between that description of property and other property owned by a 
citizen, no tribunal, acting under the authority of the United States " — 

And surely the Territorial Legislatures, when organized, are acting 
tinder our authority — 

" no tribunal, acting under the authority of the United States, whether it be Icgislalivt, 
executive, or judicial, has a right to draw such a distinction, or deny to it the benefit of the 
provisions and guarantees which have been provided for the protection of private property 
against the encroachments of the Government." 

Now, Mr. President, in that connexion, let me thank the honorable 
Senator from Mississippi for bringing the Senator from Illinois to the 
point the other day. We have got him at last where we can under- 
stand him. Again and again the distinguished Senator from Missis- 
sippi called upon the Senator from Illinois to define what he meant 
by squatter sovereignty. He was asked when and how it is that the 
people of a Territory acquired the right of self-government. I have 
here his answer. Well might the Senator from Mississippi say that 



15 



the more this subject was examined and discussed, the further we got 
apart What was the answer of the Senator from Illinois ? It was 
this ' Shall I call it absurd ? No, sir ; senatorial courtesy will not 
permit it ; but I state it in his own language almost I will read his 
words presently. When the people of this country first go into the 
wilderness and find there no government whatever, and then exercise 
that inherent right of self-defence which drives men, under the laws 
that God has implanted in them, to associate together in self-defence, 
and organize some system of law for theirown protection ; then, when 
it woufd seem to the common sense of universal mankind that no one 
could say they were wrong in doing that-then it is that the Senator 
from Illinois says he repudiates and opposes their power. That is the 
souatter soverignty that he objects to. But when the sovereign has 
Xe in ;when & the trustee of 111 the States has taken possession o 
the common fund ; when it has organized a government that suits t 
in the exercise of its discretion ; and when it has committed the au- 
ministration of the affairs of the Territory, with certain limitations 
under the Constitution of the United States, to a Territorial Legis- 
lature-then, when the sovereign is present, then the people become 
invested, by some magical process, with an inherent popular sov- 
ereignty that rises superior to the author of their being. That is the 
position of the Senator from Illinois. 

In answer to the Senator from Mississippi, he said : 

" P«rardin<r squatter sovereignty as a nick-name invented by the Senator and those with 

mere is ute cent .« u^ , j> ... ua ,, er cour ts to the United Mates courts to 

SSSKStZ ^i%%ZZX3* Nation of tHe Con^on^la^J 
ZunL States. t^J^JflB^jRE. ItCs fift l£|ate h£ 
^Tthat Te repre entld Y b J denounced that as unlawful. If that is what the 
Se a nTtor g re?erred t m against it /f 1 I say is, that the people of a Territory, when they 
Svf beVn oTanSd under Ihe Conrtit? ion and laws, have legislative power oyer all ngbt- 
ful subjects of legislation consistent with 1 che Constitution of the United States. 

Now the Supreme Court of the United States says that no tribunal, 
legislative, executive, or judicial, acting under the authority of the 
United States, can interfere with the right of a southern citizen to hi, 
property in the Territories. The honorable Senator from Illinois 
savs they cannot do it until they are organized under the authority 
of the United States. Which is right? He says the people of a 
Territory do not get the power until they are organized under the 
authority of the General Government. The Supreme Court ot the 
United States says no earthly tribunal organized under the authority 
of the United States can exercise that power. _ _ 

Now Mr President, I cannot go any further into the discussion ot 
thfs case, because, in view of my ulterior purposes in this argument, 
it is unnecessary. No sooner had that decision been made than it was 
attacked all over the land. It was attacked by the Republican party 
The honorable Senator from New Hampshire Mr. Hale] was not 
satisfied with attacking the principles of the decision, ihe Chiet 



IS 



that at that date certain principles were prevalent nfW * ? 

. Again: the honorable Senator from New York TMr fi ffW1B n l 1 
or avoid it TTo +v;«^ +~ A -j ^ . ' UI(l not attempt to evade 

with a right of appeal to thelupreme cSSS S-ffi S^atef ^V^ ™ 1 c <^ 
arise, and the court shall pronounce it, judgment it win be binding « ^ ' ^ ShaU 

<:-n every good citizen." ' e bmdlD S on me, on you, sir, and 

do by decision could b nd' the Terr itof- W 11,?^ Co "l C ° U , ld 

\'p«r 18^8 +1^ r n • - LycL ^ JU ^ Id ' 11 ^ party, it was when, m thp 

borne ealct IZttZX^t f™°W™*°* * * ™s »I . 
, B ei w return l0 the feenate, he joined m canvassing the State 



17 



of Illinois witn the gentleman who is now the candidate of the Black 
liepublican party for the Presidency. Pressed in different portions of 
.he State With this very argument, that he had agreed to leave the 
question to the court, that the court had decided it in favor of the 
^outh, and that, therefore, under the Kansas-Nebraska bill, slaverv 
was fixed in all the Territories of the United States ; finding himself 
going down m Illinois in that canvass, he backed out from his°promise, 
and directly told the people of his State that, whether it had been 
decided or not and no matter what the court might decide, the Kan- 
sas-Nebraska bill had fixed the power in the people of the North to 
make every Territory in the Union free. . 

In that contest the two candidates for the Senate of the United 
States, m the State of Illinois, went before their people. Thev agreed 
to discuss the issues ; they put questions to each other for answer ; and 
I must say here for I must be just to all, that I have been surprised 
in the examination that I made again within the last few days of 
this discussion between Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Douglas, to find that on 
several points Mr Lincoln is a far more conservative man, unless he 
has since changed his opinions, than I had supposed him to be There 
£as no dodging on his part. Mr. Douglas started with his questions. 
Here they are, with Mr. Lincoln's answers : 

"Question 1 I desire to know whether Lincoln to-day stands, as he did in 1834 in favor 
of the unconditional repeal of the fugitive slave law ? ' ' 

fugi^Xve^aw. 110 ' D ° W ' ^ ^ did ' ^ * faVOr ° f the conditional repeal of the 

"• W ", 2, - 1 dee5re him te an8wer Aether he stands pledged to-dav as he did in i»u 
= st the adrmssion of any more slave States into the 'unkS, even If The people Itt 

sia'^E '^iTvZk™ ever did ' stand plerlged •*** the adl ™ of -y — 

Htai? totoS ^t/ - WaUt -^ kn0 T Whethw he stands P led S ed a S aiQ st the admission of a new 
State mto the Union W1 th such a constitution as the people of that State may see fit to 

^I AnS I! er ' X d ? n °* Stand P Ied " ed against the admission of a new State into the Union 
with such a constitution as the people of that State may see fit to make 

in thlS^tof'Smbia^ WhetW he 8tands ^ ^^ » the abolition of slavery 

Coin££iT r " I(1 ° D ° t6tand t0 " day P led ^ edt0 the abolition of slavery in the District of 

^U^Ll^S^^^^ he 8tands ^ ed to *. P^ibition of the 

rentS£ * * DOt * Md Pledged *° the P rohiblti ™ of the slave trade between the dif- 

t-£3£ tt!£#S£fc£? is " pp0S6d w the ^" i8iti °° ° f »> ■» 

cas* I ~Z/ am n< ! t 8 eneraU y °PP 08 ^ to honest acquisitions of territory ; and in anv aiven 

which these answers were given : no equivocation-no evasion The 
Senator from Illinois had his questions put to him in his turn All I 
propose to do now is te read his answer to the second question ■ 



18 

" The next question propounded to me by Mr. Lincoln is, can the people of a Territory, in 
any lawful way, against the wishes of any citizen of the United States, exclude slavery from 
their limits prior to the formation of a State constitution? I answer emphatically, as Mr. 
Lincoln has heard me answer a hundred times from every stump in Illinois, that, in my opin- 
ion, the people of a Territory can, by lawful means, exclude slavery from their limits prior to 
the formation of a State constitution. Mr. Lincoln knew that I had answered that question 
over and over again. He heard me argue the Nebraska bill en that principle all over the 
State in 1854, in 1855, and in 1856, and he has no excuse fur pretending to be in doubt as to 
my position on that question." 

All that was true ; but see the art ; the decision had not come yet ; 
now the decision has come ; now what ? 

"IT MATTERS NOT WHAT WAY THE SUPREME COURT MAY HEREAFTER DE- 
CIDE AS TO THE ABSTRACT QUESTION, WHETBER SLAVERY MAY OR MAY NOT 
GO INTO A TERRITORY UNDER THE CONSTITUTION, THE PEOPLE HAVE THE 
LAWFUL MEANS TO INTRODUCE OR EXCLUDE IT AS THEY PLEASE, for the 
reason that slavery cannot exist a day or an hour anywhere unless it is supported by local 
police regulations. Those police regulations can only be established by the local Legisla- 
ture ; and if the people are opposed to slavery, they will elect representatives to that body 
who will, by unfriendly legislation, effectually prevent the introduction of it into their 
midst. If, on the contrary, they are for it, their legislation will favor its extension. 
Hence, NO MATTER WHAT THE DECISION OF THE SUPREME COURT MAY BE 
ON THAT ABSTRACT QUESTION, STILL THE RIGHT OF THE PEOPLE TO MAKE 
A SLAVE TERRITORY OR A FREE TERRITORY IS PERFECT AND COMPLETE 
UNDER THE NEBRASKA BILL. I hope Mr. Lincoln deems my answer satisfactory on 
that point." 

He told us, a few days ago, that he had agreed that that very ques- 
tion should be submitted to and decided by the court. He held out 
to us here, when we altogether advocated and supported the Kansas- 
Nebraska bill, that we were submitting a judicial question to the 
courts, and that when that question was decided, the Democratic party 
should be a unit on the question thus decided ; but when he goes 
home, and is pressed in a local contest, and he sees the glittering 
prize of a seat in this Chamber slipping from his grasp he turns his 
back upon his promise ; he repudiates his words ; he tells his people, 
as he says he has told them a hundred times before, that, even if the 
court decides against them, he has . in the Kansas-Nebraska act, ob- 
tained for the free States a perfect right to make a free Territory of 
every Territory in the Union, notwithstanding the decision of the 
court ; and yet the honorable Senator stands up here and arraigns his 
Democratic brethren ; accuses them of breach of faith ; talks to them 
of turning him out of the party ; and triumphantly appeals to the 
records of 1840 to show his consistency. Now, we tell him that we 
will not stand upon such promises any more. Once deceived a wise 
man may be ; twice deceived, by the same person arid the same means, 
he is a dupe and a fool. He tells us now again, "leave it to the 
courts," so that he may again go home, and addressing his people, 
say to them: "Fellow-citizens of Illinois, I have got the South for 
you. I have got them so that, no matter what the decision is, you 
can have a free Territory, and keep their slaves out always." 

Well, sir, what occurred further in that controversy ? His competi- 
tor was shocked at the profligacy of the Senator. His competitor said 
to him — and here is the argument — " everybody knows that the Dred 
Scott decision has determined the principle that a citizen of the South 
has a right to go into the Territory, and there, under the Constitution, 
his property is protected, and yet you are telling the people here that 



19 

their legislators, when they swear to support the Constitution, can 
violate that constitutional provision." Mr. Lincoln held up his hands 
in horror at the proposition. He was bold in the assertion of his own 
principles ; but he told the Senator from Illinois in that discussion that 
what he was saying was a gross outrage on propriety, and was break- 
ing the bargain he had made. But again, sir, he told the Senator 
from Illinois that he did not believe in the Dred Scott decision, be- 
cause, said he, if the Dred Scott decision be true, aud slavery extends 
in the Territories under the Constitution of the United States, then it 
also exists in the States — it exists in Pennsylvania as well as in 
Kansas. 

The contest ended. On the popular vote the Senator from Illinois 
was beaten ; but according to the division of the representative and 
senatorial districts of the State, he was re-elected. The popular vote 
upon the election of members of the Senate and Legislature was one 
hundred and twenty-one thousand in his favor, one hundred and 
twenty-five thousand in favor of the Republican candidate, and five 
thousand votes in favor of what he called the Danites. All the State 
Republican officers were elected ; but there was a majority of the Legis- 
lature of Illinois elected in favor of the Senator from Illinois, ancf he 
came back here in triumph. 

Last spring I was forced to leave my country from an attack of a dis- 
ease in the eyes, which required attention abroad. I went to get the 
attention of eminent oculists abroad. For six or eight months I was de- 
barred from reading or writing. I came back just before the opening of 
this Congress ; and I found that during my absence the honorable Sen- 
ator from Illinois had been engaged in a controversy in the public jour- 
nals and magazines of the country in relation to the principles that o-ov- 
erned the TerritDries of the United States, and that he had copied in 
those articles the very arguments that his Republican opponent in Illinois 
had used against him, and was then using against the Democratic party. 
[Laughter.] I have got them here. First, that it may not be said 
that I originated this charge, after these magazine articles were 
printed, and after the Senator's opponent, Mr. Lincoln, had taxed 
him with want of good faith under the Constitution for alleging the 
power of the local Legislature to adopt this unfriendly legislation, in 
a subsequent speech, delivered at Columbus, Ohio, in September, 1859. 
Mr. Lincoln said to the people : 

•'Judge Docglas says, If the Constitution carries slavery into the Territories, beyond the 
power of the people of the Territories to control it as other property, then it follows logi- 
cally that every one who swears to support the Constitution of the United States mrat 
^J e *J at " u PP° rt to that Property which it needs. And if the Constitution carries slavery 
into the Territories beyond the power of the people to control it us other property then 
it also carr.es it into the States, because the Constitution is the supreme law of the land 
Now, gentlemen, If U were not for my excessive modesty I would iay that I told thai very thing to 
Judge Douoms quite a year ago. T/us argutiwit is here in print, ank If it were not for my modesty 
as I said, I might call your attention to it. If you will rtqdjt, ypd 0fuid that 1 not wily made 
thai argument hut made U better than he has imce. " 

[Laughter.] 

Now, let us look at Judge Douglas's argument on this subject in 
Harper's Magazine. The Senator from Illinois, after thus deliberately 
violating the agreement that he made with his brother Democrats ; 



20 

after flying from the result of the decision which he himself had pro- 
voked and proposed; after declaring that, no matter how many decisions 
might he made, he could always get clear of them, "because he had so 
fixed it in the Nebraska bill that the people of the Territory could 
always, in spite of the decisions, make free Territories, then proceeded, 
in his canvass for the Presidency, to address himself to the people of 
the United States through a magazine ; and the next trick — I am not 
speaking of it in the sense of dishonor or dishonesty — the next fantastic 
trick of the Senator, was to dress up a magazine article with the 
answers of his i in opponent in Illinois brought forward as 

discoveries by himstd'fj and claimed as discoveries by himself, as I 
shall show ; and he put forth to the astonished gaze of the American 
republic his hew theory, that the word "States," when employed in 
the Constitution of the United States, often means '-Territories." 
Let us first look at this ! institutional discovery. In order that I 

may do the Senator no injustice I will read what, I am sure, on its 
being read, if I ha ' not the Book in my hand, would be supposed to 
be a qaricature of t'h • oj iriiobs of a public man. In speaking of the 
clause about the surrender o'f fugitives slaves, he says : 

"It will be observed that ' p term ' Prate' is used in this provision, as well as in various 
other parts of the Constii itti o-, in the same sense in which it was used by Mr. Jefferson, in 
his plan for establishing j :<;>-- for the new States in the territory ceded, and to be 

ceded, to the United Sra.r", ...-, , . c : y Mr. Madison, in his proposition to confer on Congress 
power ' to institute tc-rn] o ■■ . inents for the new States arising in the unappropriated 
lands of the United >->'■•' to lesignata the political communities, Territories as well as 
States, within the dominion ••! the United. States." 

Here it is, and h< j gi es on to prove it, as he says ; and the proof is 
so amusing that 1 wi'i ! \ elieve this rather tedious discussion by reading 
it for the amusement lit the Senate : 

"The word 'States' is nse/Ha the same Bease in the ordinance of the 13th of July, 1737, 
for the government hf rhe i r er;in ry northwest of the river Ohio, which was passed by the 
remnant of the CoagriUs ! tti« '..• ^federation, sitting in New York, while its most eminent 
members were at Pin'. \\ • ■ hit. - delegates to the federal convention, aiding in the formatiou 
of the Constitution of the i.'.njted States. 

"In this sense the v, •••.• -,": • ?:ir, 3 ' is used in the clause providing for the rendition of fugitive 
slaves, applicable to al j communities under the authority of the United States, in- 

cluding the Territory n- ws-tl :■ the several States of the Union. Under any other con- 
struction, the right 1 f 1 he •>•■ ner t«i 1 ecover his slave would be restricted to the States of the 
Union, leaving the Territories a secure place of refuge for all fugitives. The same remark is 
applicable to the clause of the Constiiution which provides that 'a person charged in any 
State with treason, felony, or other crime, who shall flee from justice, and be found in another 
State, shall, on the oemand of the executive authority of the State from which he fled, be 
delivered up to be removed to the State having jurisdiction of the crime.' Unless the term 
State, as used in these provisions of the Constitution, shall be construed to include every 
distinct politi a! c< tin sunity voder the jurisdiction of the United States, and to apply to Ter- 
ritories as well as tr. he Statei of the Union, the Territories must become a sanctuary for all 
the fugitives '-'w.. Bei vice and lattice, for all the felons and criminals who shall escape from 
the several £1 .' •- and seek retugeand immunity in the Territories. 

" If vr.v rt.'-y. i i.s' ration #OTO necessary to show that the political communities which we 
now cjJl IV i'r>ri*»s hut wniea dnrin,; tie whole period of the Confederation and the forma- 
tion <4*uie - ■ litution, weft always rt ferred to as ' States' or ' new States') are recognized 
as ' States' ; n '.u e of the ^>r©vldons ( f the Constitution, they may be found in those clauses 
which declare hui ' no JMte ehall enter into any ' treaty, alliance, or confederation; grant 
letters of nur.pie an 1 reprisal} coin n oney; emit bills of credit; make anything but gold and 
silver coin a lender 1 payment of del cs; pasi any bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law 
impairing the obligu ion of contracts. • r grant any title of nobility.' 

"It must be borne in u . h of these cases where the power is not expressly 



21 



Hence it would certainly be competent for the StVtfs , ct t«».Z.« 

■MP. OF THE CONSTITUTE OF THE U*>TLD fiftS | M ^"'^ ™ " EAKING ° F ™ ESE '« "- 

[The small capitals and notes of intense admiration are mine 1 
ihat is a constitutional argument elaborately propounded to what 
the honorable Senator from Georgia yesterday said was the nonsense 
of the country Mr. President, is it not observable, does not every- 
body see that the Senator from Illinois was driven into just that non- 
sense when he assumed the power of the people of a Territory to 
exercise what he terms squatter or popular sovereignty ? If they" be 
indeed sovereigns, he is right ; there is no prohibition on them in the 
Constitution o the United States, for the prohibitions are upon States 
alone ana not upon territorial governments. If, therefore thev be 
popular sovereigns, he does not get rid of his difficulty by sayin- that 
when the Constitution talks about States it means Territories because 
that is not so ; but he brings himself just to that reductiooA^uratZ 
wmch, with his peculiar perspicacity, he saw straight before him • if 
the lerntory is sovereign, as there is no restriction upon that sove- 
re.gntym the Constitution, because the Constitution restricts only the 
sovereignty of the States and the Federal Government, necessarily the 
people of a Territory have a right to raise armies, to wage war o 

flS/ff t0 e ^ iS !. all O th0Se P ° WerS that the Constitution 

\ • i * f? S i ates P roblblts tlie States from exercising. In order to 

get rid of this direct additional absurdity into which he was plunged 

he saw no other remedy than to appeal to the nonsense of the public 

with a statement that the Constitution of the United States meant 

Territories" when it said " States." 
. But, sir? i have id that the honorable Senator from IUinoi had 

in this magazine taken the arguments used by his Republican oppo- 
nent in the senatorial canvass in Illinois and put them before the peiple 
o the country as arguments against his Democratic associates who 
differed with him mopinion. I have read to you what Mr. Lincoln 
said on that subject m his speech in September, 1859. Here is what 
Mr. Lincoln said in the speech delivered by him in reply to Mr 
Douglas, at Jonesboro', on the 15th of September, 1858 : 

didSi^fc£^S!^ , ^^ , ( r e P T IC ofa . Te F»^y) can lawfully ex- 

SKT "r "ivSr'" s - i,>n fron ' their t* p™p« iii »». «■»« fcSSs u»& 



22 

Pretty straightforward propositions, one would suppose. 

" Hence they reach the conclusion that, as the Constitution of the United States expressly 
recognizes property in slaves, and prohibits any person from being deprived of property with- 
out due process of law, to pass an act of Congress by which a man who owned a slave on one 
side of a line would be deprived of him he took him on the other side, is depriving him of that 
property without due process of law. That I understand to be the decision of the Supreme Court. 
I understand, also, that Judge Douclas adheres most firmly to that decision ; and the difficulty 
is, how is it possible for any power to exclude slavery from the Tenitory unless in violation of 
that decision ? That is the difficulty. 

" In the Senate of the United States, in 1856, Judge Trumbull, in a speech, substantially, if 
not directly, put the same interrogatory to Judge Douglas, as to whether the people ofa Ter- 
ritory had the lawful power to exclude slavery prior to the formation ofa constitution. Judge 
Douglas then answered at considerable length, and his answer will be found in the Congres- 
sional Globe under the date of June 9, 1856. " 

I have not that answer, but I have his answer of the 2d of July, 
1856, which the Senator from Georgia read yesterday, in which he 

says: 

" My answer then was, and now is" — 

Here is his senatorial answer in Congress here : 

" My answer then was, and now is, that if the Constitution carries slavery there, let it go, 
end no power on earth can take it away ; hut if the Constitution does not carry it there, no 
power but the people can carry it there." 

Not just what he said in Illinois. Mr. Lincoln proceeds: 

u The Judge said that whether the people could exclude slavery prior to the formation 
of a constitution or not was a question to be decided by the Supreme Court. He put that 
proposition, as will be seen by the Congressional Globe, in a variety of forms, all running to 
the same thing in substance — that it was a question for the Supreme Court. I maintain 
that when he says, after the Supreme Court have decided the question, that the people may 
yet exclude slavery by any means whatever, he does virtually say that it is not a question 
for the Supreme Court. He shifts his ground. I appeal to you whether he did not say it 
was a question for the Supreme Court. Has not the Supreme Court decided that question ? 
When he now says the people may exclude slavery, does he not make it a question for the 
people? Does he not virtually shift his ground, and say that it is not a question for the 
wurt, but for the people ? This is a very simple proposition — a very plain and naked 
one." c- s e- o e a e * ■ * • 

" Again : I will ask you, my friends, if you were elected members of the Legislature what 
would be the first thing you would have to do before entering upon your duties ? Swear to 
support the Constitution of the United States. Suppose you believe, as Judge Douglas does, 
that the Constitution of the United States guaranties to your neighbor the right to hold 
slaves in that Territory — that they are his property — how can you clear your oaths unless 
you give him such legislation as is necessary to enable him to enjoy that ^operty 1 What 
do you understand by supporting the constitution ofa State or of the United States? Is it 
not to give such constitutional helps to the rights established by that constitution as may 
be practically needed ? Can you, if you swear to support the Constitution, and believe that 
the Constitution establishes a right, clear your oath without giving it support ? Do you 
support the Constitution if, knowing or believing there is a right established under it 
which needs specific legislation, you withhold that legislation ? Do you not violate and dis- 
regard your oath ? I can conceive of nothing plainer in the world. There can be nothing 
in the words ' support the Constitution' if you may run counter to it by refusing support to 
any right established under the Constitution. And what I say here will hold with still 
more force against the Judge's doctrine of 'unfriendly legislation.' How could you, having 
sworn to support the Constitution, and believing It guarantied the right to hold slaves in 
the Territories, assist in legislation intended to dtftit thai righi f That would be violating 
your own view of the Constitution. Not only so, but if you were to do so, how long would 
it take the courts to hold your votes unconstitutional and void ? Not a moment. 

" Lastly, I would ask, is not Congress itself under obligation to give legislative support to 
any right that is established in the United States Constitution i I repeat the question, is not 
Congress itself bound to give legislative support to any right that is established in the United 
States Constitution ? A member of Congress swears to support the Constitution of the 
United States ; and if he sees a right established by that Constitution which needs specific 
legislative protection, can he clear his oath without giving that protection? Let me ask you 
why mary of ue whe are opposed to slavery upon principle, give our acquiescence to a fugi- 



23 

live slave law . ; Why do we hold ourselves under obligath n to pass such a law, and abide it 
when it is passed? Because the Constitution makes provision that the owners of slaves shall 
have the right to reclaim them. It gives the right to reclaim slaves, and that is, as Judge 
Douglas says, a barren right, unless there is legislation that will enforce it." 

Now, sir, let it not be said that I am reading Republican doctrines 
here, because these very passages from the speeches of Mr. Lincoln 
were introduced as discoveries by the Senator from Illinois — these and 
the other passages in relation to the confusion between a State and a 
Territory. When the Attorney General had replied to the magazine 
article of the Senator from Illinois, a rejoinder was issued, called 
" the rejoinder of Judge Douglas to Judge Black," in which he says, 
speaking of the magazine article : 

" In that article, without assailing any one " — 

He never assails any one — 

" In that article, without assailing any one, or impugning any man's motives, I demon- 
strated beyond the possibility of cavil or dispute by any fair-minded man, that if the propo- 
sition were true, as contended by Mr. Buchanan, that slavery exists in the Territories by 
virtue of the Constitution, the conclusion is inevitable and irresistible, that it is the imperative 
duty of Congress to pass all laws necessary for its protection ; that there is and can be no 
exception to the rule that a right guarantied by the Constitution must be protected by law in 
e.11 cases where legislation is essential to its enjoyment ; that all who conscientiously believe 
that slavery exists in the Territories " — 

Senators, listen to me now. The Senator from Illinois stood here 
last week, hour after hour, and asked what was this new issue which 
we were trying to force on the party, and whence its necessity. Why 
not stand, said he, on the platform of 1856 ; why not take that Cin- 
cinnati platform which we agreed to in 1856 ? Who is it, he says, 
that is forcing these new issues on the party ? I have tracked him 
through Illinois. What did he say in his defence of the Harper's 
Magazine article about the necessity of putting this very resolution in 
the platform ? He says he has demonstrated 

"That all who conscientiously believe that slavery exists in the Territories by virtue of the 
Constitution are bound by their consciences and their oaths of fidelity to the Constitution to 
support a congressional slave code for the Territories." 

I deny that ; but I want to show his view of what our duty is : 

-And that no consideration of political expediency can relieve an honest maD, who so 
believes, from the faithful and prompt performance of this imperative duty." 

That is Judge Douglas's view of our position ; and yet, hour after 
hour, he stands up here and attacks us for doing that which he says 
our oaths and our consciences impose upon us, as a duty so imperative 
that it is impossible for us, as honest men, to avoid doing it. He 
says further, in the same " rejoinder :" 

'•I also demonstrated, in the same paper, that the Constitution, being uniform throughout 
the United States, is the same in the States as in the Territories — is the same in Pennsylvania 
as in Kansas ; and, consequently, if slavery exists in Kansas by virtue of the Constitution of 
the United States, it must of necessity exist in Pennsylvania by virtue of the same instrument ; 
and if it be the duty of the Federal Government to force the people of the Territory to sus- 
tain the institution of slavery, whether they want it or not, merely because it exists there by 
virtue of the Constitution, it becomes the duty of the Federal Government to do the same 
thing in all the States for the same reason. 

" This exposition of the question produced consternation and dismay in the camp of my 
assailants." 

He just copied the arguments from Mr. Lincoln's dispute with him, 
put them into the Harper's Magazine article, and tells us that this 



24 

exposition of Ms of the constitutional rights and duties of the States 
of this Union produced consternation and dismay amongst his assail- 
ants ! Why, Mr. President, what is there in this argument which 
the honorable Senator from Illinois has copied from those Republicans 
who again and again have attacked the decisions of the Supreme 
Court of the United States — that under the doctrine of the Dred Scott 
decision slavery exists as well in the States as in the Territories ; a 
sophism so bald, a proposition so destitute of a shadow of foundation, 
that it never was used by any man who believed it, but was put forth 
to deceive those who could not understand the question. 

What is the decision of the Supreme Court of the United States ? It 
is this, plainly and simply : Congress has jurisdiction over and power 
to govern the Territories ; the powers of Congress under the Consti- 
tution are limited ; amongst the limitations is a prohibition to destroy 
and impair or confiscate the property of citizens without due process 
of law. Slaves are property, and therefore Congress has no power to 
confiscate them, to destroy them, or to impair the right of property in 
them, without due process of law. That is what the Supreme Court 
says. What has that to do with a State ? Does Congress legislate 
for a State ? Does Congress govern a State ? Is there anything in 
the Constitution of the United States prohibiting a State from doing 
as it pleases in its own legislation, except a certain clause in which 
the prohibitions are plainly stated, and which does not include the 
slavery question at all. There are certain prohibitions on the States 
in the Constitution, and amongst them are emitting bills of credit, 
raising armies and navies, levying taxes or duties on imports, on ex- 
ports — all these are prohibited to the States. The States are not pro- 
hibited from legislating on slavery in their own limits ; but the Su- 
preme Court of the United States hold that Congress is prohibited by 
the Constitution from doing so in the Territories, and yet the Senator 
from Illinois repeats this absurd position, that because Congress can- 
not destroy property in slaves in a Territory therefore State constitu- 
tions cannot destroy it in the States ! 

It was, Mr. President, well known to the Senator from Illinois when 
he penned this article, that there was nothing in it whatever. He was 
driven to it. Every time he discusses the question, if he holds to the- 
principles he has promulgated in the Senate, and now adheres to before- 
the nation, he will be driven step by step, back and back, to the Black 
Sepublican camp. Let him beware. Let him beware of the first step^ 
outside of the intrenchments of the Constitution. Let him beware lest 
he gets so far that return becomes impossible. He has already got to- 
using their arguments, to adopting their principles, and after vaunt- 
ing here that he is the embodiment of the Democratic party, and offer- 
ing indulgence and quarter to all Democratic Senators and all Demo- 
cratic States that disagree with him, he joins in the cry that Demo- 
cratic sentiments, truly expounded, lead to disunion. 

Sir, I have trespassed on the attention of the Senate rather longer 
than I intended. I shall be. as brief as possible for the remainder of 
the time I shall occupy. The Senator from Illinois, the other day, 
went further. He has not only evaded, avoided, and circumvented 
the South by the Nebraska bill, if, indeed, it be susceptible of the 



25 

construction be gives it, and confers on the people of the Territories 
the right he now alleges, but, with all his promises, the cloven foot 
again sticks out. He warns us — yes, Senators, he warns us — that if 
the Tennessee resolution is adopted at Baltimore he will explain 
away that, too. Nothing can bind him, according to his present 
statements. Let me read this Tennessee resolution, and I will ask 
every man within the sound of my voice whether it does not seem to 
be as plain and clear as the English language can make it? Pass 
it, and, he tells you, it will not bind him. He says it has a double 
construction and a double meaning. He has prepared everybody for 
a double meaning to it. He asked the Senator from Ohio to read it ; 
and here it is. 

"Mr. Pugh read, as follows : 

"Resolved, That all citizens of the Unite:! States have an equal right to settle with their 
property in the Territories, and that under the decision of the Supreme Court, which we 
recognize as an . exposition of the Constitution, neither their rights of person or property 
oan be destroyed or impaired by congressional or territorial legislation." 

I confess that I read it over and over, and could not see a loop to 
hang a doubt on. All the citizens of the United States have an equal 
right to settle with their property in the Territories, and no territorial 
legislation can impair it. That is the Tennessee resolution. What 
is the warning given to us by the Senator from Illinois. Here it is : 

' ' We have had predictions that the party was to be reunited by the adoption of that 
resolution. The only objection that I have to it is, that it is liable to two constructions." 

The Cincinnati platform that he warns us to stick to — that, of 
course, is not. Oh, no? But this will be liable to two constructions, 
and I have pzzled my brain for an hour to get at that other construc- 
tion. I will read what the Senator said, and perhaps other Senators 
may be more fortunate than I have been. I think I have got a 
glimpse. He says it is liable to two constructions — 

"And certainly and inevitably will receive two, directly the opposite to each other, 
and each will be maintained with equal pertinacity." 

We know what the South will maintain under that resolution ; 
and who will maintain any other construction? Surely, the 
Senator from Illinois means that he will, because he knows we 
will not. We can see but one meaning, and no man imbued 
with constitutional principles can discover but one, and that is, 
that all citizens — those who own slaves, as well as those who 
own horses — have a right to go with their property into the Ter- 
ritories — have an equal right to go there ; and that their property 
shall not be impaired. But the Senator from Illinois says there is 
another construction that will be maintained, and persistently main- 
tained. And what is it? He says : 

"The resolution contains, in my opinion, two truisms; and, fairly considered, no man can 
question them." 

What is the fair consideration he gives it ? 

" They are, first, that every citizen " — 

Not " all the citizens." The resolution says all the citizens. He 
isays every citizen. But I will show you why he says so : 

' Every citizen of the United States has an equal right in the Territories; that whatever 
'right the citizen of one State has may be eDJoyed by the citizens of all of the States.' - 



26 

See how he is changing it now ! 

" That whatever property the citizen of one State may carry there, the citizens of all the 
States may carry." 

And then they will go on with the old Republican objection, that 
we are all at perfect liberty to go into the Territories without our 
property ; that we are all on an equal footing. The old Republican 
argument that was brought up here in the discussions on the Kansas- 
Nebraska bill in 1854, the Senator from Illinois tenders to us now for 
the canvass of 1860. He will tell us, " You are not excluded from 
the Territory ; a northern man goes with his horses, you may go with 
horses ; a northern man goes with a cow, you may go with a cow ; a 
northern man does not go with a slave, and you shall not go with a 
slave ;" and that is the equality that he says it means. The Senatoi 
from Illinois is kind in warning us in advance this time how this 
proposition will be got rid of. The South will be fools if they do no1 
take advantage of the warning, and see if something cannot be de- 
vised which the astute and practiced ingenuity of the Senator from 
Illinois cannot get around, if the English language can hold him, 
Now he says : 

" And on whatever terms the citizens of one State can hold it, and have it protected, the 
citizens of all States can bold it, and have it protected, withont deciding what the right if 
which still remains for decision." 

So that the Tennessee platform will leave us just where we are now, 
What is his objection to it? 

" I want no double dealing, or double construction." 

That is his objection. He wants things clear, plain, and straight 
and then when we ask that they shall be put down clear, plain, anc 
straight, he abuses us for making new tests in the party ; talks abou 1 
assaults on him ; kept the Senate occupied for eight mortal hours 
whilst he was attacking every man and every State in the entire Unior 
that would not support his pretensions for the Presidency. 

Now, Mr. President, the people have at last come to this point 
the Democratic delegates of the South have come to this point. '. 
speak not of the delegates in either House of Congress. It is tin 
fashion to speak of congressional dictation, in a certain class of publii 
journals under the control of certain public men, and yet one woulc 
suppose that a seat in Congress affords at least some prima facie proba 
bility of the possession of the confidence of the constituency, and tha 
the unanimous concurrence of opinion of the chosen representatives o 
the Democracy, both of States and constituencies, is some prima fad 
proof of what Democratic principles are. But all that is nothing. Ii 
modern slang, this is a Yancey and caucus platform, and we are con 
gressional dictators. I, therefore, leaving out of view the opinions o 
members of Congress in both branches of the General Assembly of tin 
United States, now say that it has been demonstrated by the delegate; 
of the South, sent by the State conventions from primary meetings 
that the time has come when all constitutional rights guarantied t< 
us under the decision of the Supreme Court — which was taken by tin 
Senator from Illinois and his coadjutors as the common arbiter of oui 
dispute — shall be acknowledged ; that all that we demand shall b< 



27 

put down in the bond ; that there shall be no longer a doubt in rela- 
tion to it. 

Mr. President, when mere private rights of property are concerned, 
when the question is, who owns a farm, or who owns a horse, or who 
is entitled to §100, it is an old aphorism of the law, misera est servi- 
ius, ubi jus aut vagum aut incertum est— wretched and deplorable is 
the slavery where the law which governs a man's right is vao-ue or 
uncertain. And shall we, we who represent Democratic States and De- 
mocratic constituencies, be asked why it is that we will not leave these 
rights, on which they rest for their property, which are even vital to 
their existence, open to doubt and denial? "Shall we be asked why it 
is that we demand that the charter of these rights be written clearly, 
plainly, beyond the possibility of doubt or misconstruction ? Oh, no. 
says the Senator from Illinois, li in 1856 we were unanimous upon the 
Cincinnati platform ; I have given it a construction, and the Charles- 
ton convention has backed my construction, and I am the Democratic 
party;" and it is his construction, and the construction adopted by a 
minority at Charleston, that he presents to us here, and asks us "by 
what right we call for something plainer or clearer as the charter of 
our constitutional privileges ? Miserable and deplorable is the slavery 
where the law governing the property of the individual is doubtful or 
uncertain. Degrading and dishonoring to a State is it when its sove- 
reignty cannot ask for an expression or acknowledgment of its sove- 
reign rights in an assembly of equals. The people of the South do 
not mean to be put off this time with any doubtful or vague construc- 
tion. The Senator from Illinois is opposed to double meanings and 
double constructions ; he dislikes the Tennessee platform on that 
ground. We share his dislike ; fas est ab hoste doceri — we will be 
taught by him. We will ask that everything in our platform be put 
down plainly and clearly. 

Mr. President, the honorable Senator from Illinois, in the plenti- 
tude of his power, tells us that the Democratic platform has been 
adopted, and backs him. He next tells us that it is glory enough for 
him to have been supported by a majority of the delegates of the 
Democratic party at a convention ; and then with an allusion, some- 
what transparent, to a course of proceeding by others which would 
be agreeable to him, he says that when others got a majority he sent 
word to his friends to vote for them. He does not say that he thinks 
everybody ought to send word to vote for him 3 but he leaves it to us, 
if we are generous or liberal, to draw our own conclusions. Now, 
Mr. President, I know what happened at that convention only from 
the public records of the country, and the report of its delegates. It 
f : s reported that, as his highest vote, upon one or two ballots, the 
iionorable Senator from Illinois received one hundred and fifty-two 
Lind a half votes, and I think that was the highest. 
. Mr. PUGH. For several ballots — seven or eight. 

Mr. BENJAMIN. How did he get them? Were there one hun- 
dred and fifty-two delegates in the convention of whom he was the 
Choice ? 

Mr. PUGH. Certainly ; they expressed it by their vote. 

Mr. BENJAMIN. Oh, that was part of the arrangement by which 



28 

those who were not candidates for the Presidency were caught, but 
the truth of history will leak out in despite of those little arrange- 
ments. [Laughter.] I had here amongst my papers, I think, the 
speech of a delegate, who explains this majority. 

Mr. PUGH. State the substance of it. If it was said at Charleston 
I shall recollect it. 

Mr. BENJAMIN. Well, sir, I will state the substance of it ; I 
cannot find the extract I had, and I shall have to affix it to my speech. 
Gentlemen have doubtless seen it. Scarcely had the Charleston con- 
vention met, and a committee been appointed on organization, when 
it reported an organization of presidents, vice presidents, and secreta- 
ries, and sprung this resolution on the convention instanter — the con- 
vention had previously adopted the rules of the previous Democratic 
conventions — 

" The committee further recommend" — 

The subject was not committed to them at all — 

"The committee further recommend that the rules and regulations adopted by the De- 
mocratic conventions of 1852 and 1856 be adopted by this convention for its government ; 
with this additional rule : 

" That any State which has not provided or directed by its State convention how its 
votes may be given, the convention will recognize the right of each delegate to cast his 
individual vote." 

As a certain gentleman was a candidate for the Presidency — Heaven 
preserve the country from candidates for the Presidency ! — wherever 
the gentleman's friends were in the majority, they had taken special 
pains, by preorganization, to get a resolution passed at the State con- 
ventions instructing the delegates to vote as a unit, and thus they 
fastened down every man in a minority in the United States, and in 
spite of himself got his vote cast for the Senator from Illinois, although 
he was opposed to him. But the conventions in other States leaving 
the Democratic delegates to the instincts of their own judgment ; 
leaving in operation the time-honored traditions of the party ; not 
tying up their delegations by instructions, left them to act as they 
might think proper ; and when they got to Charleston, by forcing 
the votes of all the minorities that were against Mr. Douglas, and 
freeing the hands of all the minorities that were in his favor, his 
friends had cast for him all the minorities, both those for him and 
those against him, in all the United States. That is the way he got 
one vote more than half the convention. Now, what I was looking 
for was this : the distinct statement of a delagate from Massachusetts, 
[Mr. Butler,] that there were fifteen steady, persistent votes against 
the Senator from Illinois from the State of New York alone. I am 
telling you what Mr. Butler said. 

Mr. PUGH. I read his speech last night ; I think he said twelve. 

Mr. BENJAMIN. I read it this morning ; it said fifteen. It may 
have changed since last night. 

Mr. PUGH. Very well; fifteen delegates. 

Mr. BENJAMIN. He says there were fifteen delegates from New 
York alone who were steady, persistent opponents of Mr. Douglas ; 
yet those votes were cast for him. There was a minority in Indiana; 
but those votes were cast for him. There were minorities in other 
States, which I added up ; and instead of having a majority of the; 



29 



itn g M n Democra 1C P art ^ throughout the United States in his 
favor, Mr. Douglas was in a lean minority of but one-third of th» 
delegates and that one-third exclusively from Hepublican States 

ttvZ ™ testify was opposed to him unanimously. Mr 

Butler says so My friend from Minnesota [Mr. Ricej has just handed 
me the extract m the Constitution of this morning and J I will Zd 

a^ to^Y^i ^f" ° f * and lf * ^ ™« in * «' 

M^ £™ Pi ,rT^ ad " iD the Herald la8t night. 

stents E a?it^ \ &***> giv ^ aa account to »*■«»- 

fnS him SES? sstes^a?* but which w«^ «* 

Mr. PUGH. Not one. 
Mr. BENJAMIN— 

ed" buHe^r^rf J «*«■*•» «».P«*«t tohis^Sot 

n fnciin " t ' ■ t countlI1 g an y ""re, fifteen in New York, five 

in Indiana, two in Minnesota, make twenty-two Take twentv t.I 

from one hundred and fifty, two, and thereremi n one bunTed'and 

Ohio 7 ' But* I* ? S0i : ta '7 V0 't ^ ai " St him ^m thfs" 
to bo ente ed VnL i t? S"*"I lnt * *T "Wfa, which ought not 
w! rt £ ?. the Senat «. »nd which I certainly never would 

from IllTnt ttt SP thf ln? ° f i bUt f °, r - the C0UStMt ™»t of the Senator 
nation Xt th» he f ma J or , '{ T K 8 '. ancl he was titled *» a nomi- 
nation that the party had backed his principles and that m ,„ 

Bum "tafof'wlal^t ri J^Iays ** *" "* ^ "* a8 the 

wi^evl^ even to a disruption of the party; 

the sJrBbS^^^t^iSSi^ ' ^^^^ of the delegation of 
New Jersey divided and [the nlvtlt° v ^' °, ne " halt nearl y of New Yo1 * hostile, 
much hope (Connecticutl toLte IS £? ew ^ la ? d where the Democracy can have 
delegate to do?" ' 7 qUa " y ba!anced > what was it the part of wisdom for your 

doe^he sayt C1UeSti ° n ^ ^^ P re8ents to his constituency. What 

h -t a pleasant position SS^DeScrt *" " ^ " ^ " 

This is Mr. Butler's language : 

of Re^n^tive.^ 086 " ^ & ^ ^ ^^ of the democratic members of the House 

We have watched him here ■ 



30 

make sweet wine. Cold apathy and violent opposition are not th'e prolific parent of votes. 
I found, worse than all for a Democratic candidate for the Presidency, that the Clerk of the 
Republican House of Representatives was openly quoted as saying that the influential 
paper controlled by him would either support Douglas or Seward, thus making himself, 
apparently, an unpleasant connecting link between them. 

" With these facts before me, and impressing upon me the conviction that the nomina- 
tion of Judge Douglas could not be made with any hope of safety to the Democratic party, 
what was I to do ? I will tell you what I did do, and I am afraid it is not what I ought to 
have done. Yielding to your preference, I voted seven times for Judge Douglas, although 
my judgment told me that my votes were worse than useless, as they gave him an appear- 
ance of strength in the convention which I felt he had not, in fact, in the Democratic 
party." 

That is the gentleman who stands up here, and as the embodiment 
of the Democratic party challenges the entire body of his Democratic 
fellow-Senators. 

Now, Mr. President, all that I have said has been said somewhat in 
indignation. It was not in human nature not to feel indignation at 
the charges so profusely scattered against me and my friends, and my 
State ; but still, sir, after all " more in sorrow than in anger." Up 
to the years 1857 and 1858, no man in this nation had a higher or 
more exalted opinion of the character, the services, and the political 
integrity of the Senator from Illinois than I had. I can appeal to 
those who may*have heard me in the last presidential canvass, in my 
State, where, for months together, day and night, I was travelling in 
support of the Democratic party, and helping, as far as my humble 
abilities would admit, to break down the Know-Nothing party, which 
had then a decided majority of the voters of our State inscribed in its 
lodges. We succeeded in that contest. The canvass was a successful 
one ; and it did so happen that, in the course of that canvass, I had 
again and again to appeal to my Democratic fellow-citizens of the State 
of Louisiana to stand by the gallant Democracy of the North who stood 
by us, to frown down this new organization, whose only effect could 
be to injure the Democratic candidate and his success ; and then, in 
speaking of that bright galaxy of Democratic talent, Democratic integ- 
rity, and Democratic statesmanship, that I now see gathered and 
clustered around me, the central figure was the honored portrait of 
the Senator from Illinois. 

Sir, it has been with reluctance and sorrow that I have been obliged 
to pluck down my idol from his place on high, and refuse to him any 
more support or confidence as a member of the party. I have done so, 
I trust, upon no light or unworthy ground. I have not done so alone. 
The causes that have operated on me have operated on the Democratic 
party of the United States, and have operated an effect >which the 
whole future life of the Senator will be utterly unable to obliterate. 
It is impossible that confidence thus lost can be restored. On what 
ground has that confidence been forfeited, and why is it that we now 
refuse him our support and fellowship ? I have stated our reason to- 
day. I have appealed to the record. I have not followed him back 
in the false issue or the feigned traverse that he makes in relation to 
matters that are not now in contest between him and the Democratic 
party, The question is not what we all said or believed in 1840 or in 
1856. How idle was it to search ancient precedents, and accumulate 
old quotations from what Senators may have at different times said in 



31 



relation to their principles and views. The precise point, the direct 
arraignment, the plain and explicit allegation made against the Sen- 
ator from Illinois is not touched by him in all of his speech 

We accuse him for this, to wit : that having bargained with us 
upon a point upon which we were at issue, that it should be consid- 
ered a judicial point ; that he would abide the decision ; that he would 
act under the decision, and consider it a doctrine of the party • that 
iiaving said that to us here in the Senate, he went home, and under 
the stress of a local election, his knees gave way ; his whole person 
trembled. His adversary stood upon principle and was beaten ; and 

t?' -rVL. CaD mJ ( H e of a mi " ht y P art ^ for the Presidency of the 
United States The Senator from Illinois faltered. He got the prize 
tor which he faltered ; but lo, the grand prize of his ambition to-day 
slips from his grasp because of his faltering in his former contest, and 
nis success m the canvass for the Senate, purchased for an ignoble 
price, has cost him the loss of the Presidency of the United States 

Here were two men, struggling before the people of a State on two 
great sides of a political controversy that was dividing the Union, 
eacn JO r empire at home. One stood on principle— was defeated To- 
day where stands he ? The other faltered— received the prize : but, 
to-day, where stands he? Not at the head of the Democratic party 
of these United States. He is a fallen star. We have separated from 
mm. He is right m saying we have separated from him. We have 
separated from him, not because he held principles in 1856 different 
irom ours. VVehave separated from him, not because we are intol- 
erant of opposition from anybody, for the Senator from Ohio TMr 
ruGHj is an honored member of our organization. We separated from 
him because he has denied the bargain that he made when he went 

fwVu- TT' tGr telHng us here in tbe Senate tnat h e was willing 
that this whole matter should be decided by the Supreme Court, i£ 
.he face of his people, he told them that he had got us by the bill ; and 
tnat wlietherthe decision was for us or against us, the practical effect 
was to be against us ; and because he shows us now again that he is 
ready to make use of Black Republican arguments used against him- 
seft at home, and to put them forth against the Democratic party in 
speeches here in the Senate. 1 J 

Wn W u M Q Pr f 8i( * ent » tl » s wi U ^ -presented as an attack on the 
honorable Senator from Illinois ; \„ I finish my speech, as he did 
hi B by saying, "the Senate will uear me witness that I have not 
spoken on this subject until attacked ; all I have said is in self-defence, 
I attack no man and the world shall know if ever I speak again, it 
shall be m self-defence." [Laughter.] Mr. President, the best de- 
fence is to carry the war into the enemy's country. I belong to no 
school of politicians that stand on the defensive. If attacked I strike 

knlT fT r ? 1L , If ? he Senat0r from Illinoia wants th * world to 
t,V.L * hath * spoke only in self-defence, let the same measure of jus- 
tice be meted out to me, and in answer to any one who can, by possi- 

\1 L J\T S 'i t W h l * W sakl as an attack > I re ply " self'detence." 
Laughter, j I wish my speech qualified just like that of the honor- 



32 

able Senator from Illinois. If his is an attack, mine is ; if his is ' 'self- 
defence" against some unknown person, mine also is " self-defence" 
against some body that has attacked me and my State, whose name I 
do not know. [Laughter.] That is just my position, I state it plainly ; 
I am sorry the Senator i3 not here to hear it stated. 



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